Rogue Christmas
by Sand-wolf579
Summary: Len and Lisa have never really celebrated Christmas, so Mick takes it upon himself to change that. Of course, if they're going to be doing this, it had to be done right.
1. Chapter 1

**A/N: I'm not entirely sure where this story came from, but here it is! It's not going to be all happy and funny like I know many Christmas fics are, no, because I like being different and this is Mick and Len that I'm writing about. It's going to be more of a angsty/fluffy thing, because I seem to be incapable of writing just happy stuff.**

 **Anyways, in this story Mick is 26, Len is 23, and Lisa is 16. I find it kind of odd that I don't keep the age difference between Len and Lisa the same, but I wanted it to be different in this story because I didn't want Len to be too old, or Lisa to be too young. So instead of the usual 12 year difference that I see between them, we get a measly 7 year difference...oh no.**

 **I do not own the Rogues or any of these characters.**

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If Mick had to pick just a single word to use to describe winter, it would be that it sucked. Seriously, it was the stupidest season ever, and he despised almost everything about it. Mick was a fan of flames and heat, not of the snowy cold. He absolutely hated the unforgiving harshness of a winter storm, and he didn't understand how anybody could like it.

As if Mick didn't hate snow enough already, it was even worse to try to drive in it. No, forget about just driving during a snowstorm, try driving on icy country roads more than an hour away from the city, your best friend silently brooding in the front seat while his bratty teenage sister chatted up a storm in the back. _That_ was absolute torture, and was now what Mick envisioned Hell was going to be like when he inevitably winded up there.

The truly sad thing about all of this was that Mick only had himself to blame for this mess. After all, this had all been his idea.

"Are we there yet?" Lisa groaned for the fifth time from her place in the back. Her complaining made her sound much more like a whiny eight year old girl than the young woman twice that age that she really was.

Mick's grip on the steering wheel tightened as he tried not to lose control of his temper. Usually he didn't even bother watching his anger. He let his rage burn like a fire and counted on the fact that Len would stop him before things got out of hand. Right now though, while he was driving on icy roads with two of the only people he actually cared about in the car with him, Mick knew he couldn't afford to lose his temper. Just this once he had to watch himself, because he really didn't want to deal with the consequences if something went wrong.

"Does it look like we're there yet?" Mick growled. He didn't have to look back to know that Lisa was shrugging at him.

"I don't know. Everything out here looks the same to me." Lisa sighed boredly and Mick rolled his eyes. Of course everything out here in the country looked the same to her. Lisa was a city girl through and through. Mick himself had been living in Central City for years now that he had almost forgotten how annoyed he used to get at the attitudes of people who came from the city.

Mick had grown up on a farm and rarely ever even went into the nearby town, let alone a larger city like Central City. To him, Central City might as well have been another planet, and the behaviors of those that lived there did nothing to change his opinion. They all acted so weird.

Mick had gotten used to the strange behaviors that seemed to come with living in the city, but it seemed like him returning to the country was already bringing out some long forgotten farm boy parts of him. Well, it would certainly make these next few weeks interesting. Mick briefly wondered if any of his other old habits would come out during that time.

Lisa, who was still extremely bored but knew better than to push Mick's buttons any further, decided to stop talking. Mick was able to appreciate the silence for all of five minutes before Lisa leaned forward from the back and started fiddling with the radio. Mick really didn't mind all that much. He wasn't normally the type to listen to music, but hey, if it kept Lisa quiet, he was all for it.

The only thing was, Lisa couldn't make up her mind on a station.

Mick kept his mouth shut as Lisa browsed through the stations, even though it was incredibly awkward for her to be doing so from the back, and seriously annoying that she wasn't even picking anything to listen to. Mick honestly believed that she wasn't even interested in listening to music at all, she just wanted some sound to fill the silence.

Finally, nearly five minutes later, Lisa decided on a station. Satisfied with herself Lisa leaned back into her seat and smiled. Mick let out a breath in relief, which he immediately wished he could take back once he realized just what they were listening to right now.

Country music.

Mick groaned, feeling a powerful urge to punch something. Former farm kid or not, Mick absolutely _despised_ country music, and he always had, even as a kid. Len _knew_ this, and according to the smirk on Lisa's face she was well aware of it too.

Mick bore through all of thirty seconds of the song that was playing before he snapped and just turned off the radio before he completely lost it.

"Aw, come on." Lisa whined. "You could have lasted longer than that." Mick scowled and glared at her through the rearview mirror.

"Why don't you look out the window and watch the snow fall?" Mick growled. He cast a sideways glance at Len. "Your brother seems to find it fun."

Lisa rolled her eyes. "My brother would find watching paint dry to be fun." Mick frowned, because that sounded a lot more bitter than the usual teasing that went on between the two of them. Lisa and Len were always getting on each others nerves and complaining about one thing or another, but it was usually in a teasing way that they obviously didn't mean. Lisa's tone suggested that she meant it in a more harmful way.

Which meant that, for whatever reason, Lisa was actually mad at her brother. Mick groaned and cursed the lack of observation skills that he had. How had he not noticed that the siblings were fighting when it was literally right under his nose? Actually, now that Mick knew that they were fighting he realized that some other things made sense as well.

Like Lisa's insistence at annoying him and trying to get his attention while she ignored her brother. Them fighting even explained why Len had been so quiet during this whole drive. Len was usually a talkative person, or at least he was when he felt comfortable around the people he was with, but Len hadn't said a word this whole time. Mick had thought that he had just been moping about something, or had just gotten so sucked into watching it snow that he was oblivious to what was going on around him.

Except that was much more Mick's style (with fire, not snow), and not exactly the type of thing that Len would actually though. Len was much too careful to let himself become oblivious to his surroundings.

That is, unless that was what he was specifically trying to do.

For the last few years Mick had noticed that Len would zone out every once and awhile. It was kinda his coping mechanism or something, a way for him to avoid things when he wanted to. Usually when this happened it was connected to Len's father in one way or another, like it was Len's way to protect himself from his father's physical and verbal abuse. So why was Len doing it now? Was his and Lisa's fight so bad that he honestly felt the need to protect himself like this? From Lisa?

It didn't make any sense.

Mick stopped trying to think about it. He didn't think he would ever understand Len's mind and how it worked. If the psychologists back at juvie and prison couldn't figure Len out, there was absolutely no way that Mick could. Len was a mystery, and he was going to stay that way.

The rest of the drive was in tense silence. Len didn't say a word (duh) and Lisa sat fuming in the back, probably giving the silent treatment a try. Mick focused mostly on the road, though occasionally he would look from one sibling to the other, just waiting for the inevitable blowout. He knew that a confrontation was going to happen, it always did whenever these two fought, but he just didn't know when.

Fortunately their destination wasn't too far away at this point. After not even ten minutes of the silence Mick saw the dirt road path that he remembered he was supposed to turn onto. Driving on dirt in the winter was even more of a pain in the ass than driving on an asphalt street, but Mick was able to struggle his way through.

After what felt like forever Mick pulled in front of the small, solitary house at the end of the road. Turning off the ignition Mick silently praised whatever deity had had a hand in helping them to arrive without getting stuck in the snow or the Snart siblings starting World War III.

"Ugh, finally." Lisa wrapped her coat tightly around herself and hopped out of the vehicle. Mick turned towards Len and saw that he was still staring blankly out the window. He hadn't moved an inch, as if he hadn't even realized that they had stopped. Mick cursed under his breath. Len was even more out of it than he had thought.

"Come on, Leonard." Mick said. He reached out his hand and gently shook Len's shoulder a bit. Len blinked a bit, the focused look coming back into his eyes. Len turned slightly and glared at Mick, who inwardly breathed a sigh of relief. "We're here." Len nodded stiffly, which was probably all the reaction Mick would be getting from him right now.

Mick, who knew that it usually took a few minutes for Len to become fully aware of his surroundings again, got out of the car and went to join Lisa, who had been waiting impatiently on the front step.

"Hurry up," Lisa said shortly. "It's cold."

"You don't have to tell me that." Mick quickly agreed. He bent down, lifted the welcome mat and picked up the key that was regularly kept underneath. Mick used the key to open the front door. Lisa rushed inside with Mick close behind her. Lisa looked curiously at the many pictures that were kept around the house while Mick immediately went to the fireplace. It was warmer inside the house than outside, but it was still freezing. They needed some heat circulating around the house.

It didn't take long for Mick to get a nice, warm fire going. He watched the fire crackle and burn for a bit before until he heard Lisa giggling in the hall. Mick scowled and reluctantly got to his feet. Mick trudged back into the hallway and found Lisa fawning over one of the pictures.

"Mick, this is so cute." Lisa giggled. Mick looked at the photograph and groaned. He should have thought of hiding that stupid thing. It was a picture of his eighteen year old self, with two small children fast asleep and snuggling on his lap. It was a pretty adorable picture, and Mick had been caught completely off guard with it. If he had known that his picture was going to be taken, he never would have agreed to tell that that stupid story to the two brats.

"Well, isn't that just adorable." Mick and Lisa both jumped. Neither of them had even noticed that Len had come into the house, let alone that he had been standing directly behind them looking over their shoulders.

"Alright, that's enough." Mick snatched the picture out of Lisa's hand and put it face down on the table. He scowled at Lis and Len who were both smirking at him.

"It likes like you had good memories from this place." Len commented.

"As far as foster homes go, I got lucky." Mick recognized that much. He hadn't been in the system for very long, less than two years, but he had stayed with this one family, the Stewarts, that whole time...alright, he hadn't exactly _stayed_ with them the _entire_ time, he had been in Juvie for more than half that time. But even then the Stewarts had been his guardians, and even though they didn't have to they still kept an eye on him.

The Stewarts were pretty exceptional as far as foster parents went. They took their jobs as guardians seriously, even when a kid wasn't actually living with them. As far as the Stewarts were concerned, once a kid had been under their care they were their responsibility from that point on.

Even after a kid left their care, whether because they were being sent to another home or because they were leaving the system entirely, the Stewarts still did what they could to keep in contact with them, to make sure they were doing alright. To this day Mick still got the occasional phone calls from Mrs. Stewart, who just wanted to check up on him.

It was a little annoying sometimes, and Mick often felt uncomfortable about it, he wasn't used to somebody actually caring for him like this. It was kinda unnerving for him. Still, it was nice to know that there was somebody out there who actually gave a damn about him, even if he couldn't imagine why.

Mick had never understood the Stewarts, and he was pretty sure that he understood them even less now than he ever had before. It just didn't make any sense. Old foster parents or not, what kind of people let a well-known criminal stay in their house for a few weeks while they're gone on vacation?

Mick didn't understand it, but he wasn't about to complain about it. All that mattered was the Stewarts were letting him, Len and Lisa stay in their house while they were gone for a christmas vacation. The 'why' behind it didn't really matter. Not to Mick.

"So, what exactly is the plan here?" Len asked with a slight tilt of his head. Mick rolled his eyes, though he really shouldn't be surprised about this. Len was the type of person who liked to know exactly what he was doing when. He hated not having a plan, but what he hated even more than that was being kept in the dark of what the plan was.

Mick tried to think of what to say to Len. Truth be told, he didn't really have a plan, exactly. At least, not one with specific steps that Len surely wanted to know about. What he had wasn't even a plan, more like an idea.

Len had told Mick once that he and Lisa had never really got to celebrate Christmas in the traditional way, or at all, when they were kids. This had been completely mind blowing for Mick, who had lived with two families, his own and the Stewarts, both of whom had been really big into Christmas.

Mick himself felt kind of neutral about the holiday, but he didn't think it right or fair that neither Lisa nor Len would get the chance to actually celebrate it. So he had come up with this plan to just celebrate Christmas properly with the two of them this year.

At first he had just planned on doing it at one of their multiple safe-houses, but when Mrs. Stewart had heard about his plan she immediately offered up her own home for him to use. Mick hadn't wanted to accept her offer, but he wasn't sure that he knew how to do full out Christmas in the city, so he had accepted.

Now, here they were, at the Stewarts' house, with just a week and a half until Christmas. Mick thought that the house looked strangely bare, with no decorations up. Usually the Stewarts put up decorations and stuff the day after Thanksgiving, but this year since they had gone out of town they hadn't even bothered.

Well, at least Mick now knew where to start.

"Well, first we gotta make this place look more festive." Mick said. Lisa's face lit up in excitement while Len frowned, not exactly angrily, but he clearly wasn't happy. Mick wasn't sure what his deal was, but he didn't bother thinking too much about it right now. Worrying about Len could wait until after this place actually looked like it was Christmas time.

If Mick was being honest with himself, he wasn't a big fan of putting up decorations and stuff. Sure, some of it was nice and fun, but other stuff was just junk. However, he was still going to put it all up, because the decorations were a vital part of the whole Christmas experience.

If they were going to be celebrating Christmas, they had to do it right.

Mick brought Lisa and Len up into the attic and showed them where they kept the boxes that held the Christmas decorations. Len begrudgingly opened one of the boxes and stared critically at the Santa themed decorations. For some reason this irritated Lisa who said something snarky towards her brother. Len, in a manner that was so unlike him, shoved the box to the side, ignored Lisa's curses that we directed at him and silently returned downstairs empty handed.

Mick groaned and wondered if there was any scotch or booze in the kitchen, because he seriously felt like having a drink right now. Their stay had just begun and Mick could already tell that it was going to be one hell of a Christmas.

...Mick just didn't know whether that was a good thing or not.

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 **A/N: In case you didn't figure it out yourself, this is not the only chapter. There will be a few more with this one. I will update within a few days, until then, keep on being amazing.**


	2. Chapter 2

Mick always hated it whenever Len and Lisa got into one of their actual fights. Not the usual sibling rivalry and teasing thing, but actual bitter, angry fights that was one part yelling at each other, and two parts pretending like the other person didn't exist. Despite the seven year gap between them Len and Lisa were actually quite close as siblings, but even they had their moments when they couldn't stand being around each other.

Mick didn't like being in the middle of their fights, especially since half the time he either didn't understand or didn't care about what it was even about in the first place. Still, over the past few years Mick had learned a few tricks on how to deal with them. Basically he just had to listen to the two of them complain about their issues with each other and after they got their problems off their chest they usually worked things out on their own.

As usual Mick decided to start with Len, since he was the Snart sibling that he knew better. As Lisa browsed through the multiple boxes of Christmas decorations Mick grabbed the large box that had the Christmas tree inside and went downstairs. It didn't take him long to find Len, who was sitting in the kitchen. He was drinking...something. It took Mick only a moment to see that Len was drinking scotch.

"That's just not fair." Mick literally dropped the box he was holding and snatched the bottle away from Len. "Where did you get this?"

"That's for me to know and you to find out." Len said smugly. Mick thought of two ways that Len would have gotten the scotch. Either Len, who wasn't usually a drinker, had thought ahead and brought a supply of booze with him, or in the five minutes that they had been in this house he had managed to find Mr. Stewart's secret alcohol stash that Mick hadn't been able to find in nearly ten years. Honestly, Mick had no idea which option was most likely.

Mick took a drink from the bottle, relishing in the burning feeling in his throat that it brought. "I know I'm going to regret asking this, but what's going on with you and Lisa?"

Len sighed. "I don't really know." Mick snorted and Len glared at him.

"Sorry, but you and Lis are fighting, and you don't even know why?" Mick probably found this funnier than he should.

"No, I don't." Len said coldly. "She's just had so much attitude lately. She's mad at me about something, and I don't know what." Well, that explained Len's moodiness. If there was one thing Len hated, it was not knowing something. Especially something that concerned his sister.

"Are you sure your sister's actually mad at you?" Mick asked, because usually when Lisa had a problem with her brother, she confronted him about it. Len raised an eyebrow at him.

"Why else would she be acting like this?" Len asked. "She's obviously irritated about something, and she's taking her irritation out on me. Wouldn't that meant that I'm the one that she has a problem with?" It was a logical conclusion, and one that was just so Len. There was just one thing that Len hadn't seemed to get a grasp on yet.

Lisa was a teenage now. As much as Len probably hated it, Lisa was growing up. She was at the age where she was figuring out who she was, and for some reason that included going through her rebellious stage. Lisa would never dare to act defiantly towards her father, so she instead acted up against her brother.

Mick wasn't so sure that Lisa or Len even realized that that was what was happening. Mick himself hadn't even realized it until after he had noticed that as Lisa got older the real fights between the two siblings happened more and more frequently. It took him some time, but Mick had figured out why. Len would probably have figured it out sooner if he wasn't in denial about Lisa getting older at all.

So, it seemed like, once again, Len was as in the dark as to what they were fighting about as Mick was. It would be pretty hard to get any information from him. That just left Lisa. Mick was not looking forward to trying to get information from her. It wasn't that he didn't like talking to her and didn't care about her problems, but it was just so weird to hear her whine about her brother.

Since Mick wasn't exactly in a hurry he sat down next to Len at the small kitchen table and 'helped' him to finish off the bottle of scotch. Both of them were too lazy to get off their asses and actually get glasses or something, so instead they just took turns drinking from the bottle.

They were both feeling somewhat buzzed after a while, and yet when they heard the sound of Lisa's feet starting down the stairs Len seemed to sober up immediately. Without saying a word Len grabbed the bottle out of Mick's hand (it took so much self control for Mick to not growl and steal it back) and hid it in one of the cabinets. He then returned to his seat next to Mick, as cool and collected as he ever had been. A moment later Lisa poked her head into the kitchen and frowned when she saw the two of them sitting there.

"Are you guys seriously making me do all the work?" Lisa huffed.

"I'm comin'." Mick grunted and got to his feet. He made eye contact with Len and kicked at the large box he had dropped earlier. "You think you can do this on your own?" Mick thought that setting up the Christmas tree would be a good task for Len. It would give him something to do.

Normally Mick was the one who did the tree, just because he had always been the tallest and didn't have much of an eye for smaller details and finding good places to put the tiny decorations, but he could change things up this year. Lisa would be pissed off if she felt like she was the only one doing any of the work, because unlike Len, she hated working on her own. Besides, working so closely with Lisa would give Mick the chance to have that conversation with her...the conversation that he was still not looking forward to having.

After quickly telling Len where to set up the fake Christmas tree (yeah, as if this home would ever use a real one. The Stewart's may live in the country, but they had so many kids living in their small house at a time that they didn't dare to bring in any real tree) Mick followed Lisa back up to the attic to get the rest of the boxes.

She was obviously still in a very bad mood, but it at least seemed like she was starting to simmer down a bit. With most of the boxes downstairs Lisa started looking from one box to another. She would open a box, take out a decoration or two, look at it for a minute before putting it back and moving on to the next box. Lisa finally stopped to properly unpack a box when she found the one filled with snow globes (Mick had forgotten how many Christmas decorations the Stewards had. Seriously, a whole box just for _snow globes?_ )

Lisa started lining up the snow globes carefully on a shelf that had previously been filled with pictures. Mick had been more than happy to store away the pictures until after the holidays were over. Mick found it strange that Lisa picked up the snow globes one at a time, shook them up nice and good and then just watched them for a minute before actually setting it on the shelf and moving on to the next one.

Mick, who was confused by Lisa's careful treatment of the snow globes, even the cheap ones, watched her cautious fascination with a type of fascination of his own. There was this look in her eyes, half full of joy and wonder, and half intense sorrow and longing for something that was long since gone.

"What's goin' on with you?" Mick asked as he leaned against the wall.

"You know, Len used to love snow globes when we were younger." Lisa said with a small smile. "It was, like, the one type of Christmas decoration that he actually tolerated."

"Really?" Mick raised an eyebrow, he hadn't known that Len liked snow globes. Mick considered that for a second before realizing the meaning behind Lisa's other words. "Wait, your brother hates Christmas decorations." Forget having a liking for snow globes, Mick felt like _this_ was something he should have known before now.

"He hates Christmas in general." Lisa muttered. Mick's eyes widened and he was sure that he had heard that wrong.

"Are you sure?" Mick asked, because it just didn't sound right at all. There weren't many things in the world that Len hated. Many things annoyed him, but not a lot did he actually bother hating. Mick couldn't imagine any reason as to why Len would hate Christmas, and with Len there was always a reason.

"Well, he certainly acts like it." Lisa crossed her arms and narrowed her eyes angrily. "You saw what he was like today. He gets like that every year around Christmas, and I _hate_ it."

"...Wait, you're mad at your brother because he's moody right now?" Mick seriously didn't understand what was going on anymore. He had thought that Len was only in a rotten mood because Lisa was mad at him, and he was pretty sure that Len thought the same thing.

"It's not _just_ that he's moody." Lisa seemed agitated that Mick didn't understand what she was saying.

"So what is it?" Mick asked, because there was no way he was going to understand what was bothering her if she didn't tell him. He wasn't a mind reader. "Is it really all that bad that your brother hates Christmas." Mick still didn't believe that though.

"I don't know." Lisa shifted uncomfortably for a bit and glanced at the wall. "I seriously couldn't care less about how he feels about some stupid holiday that we don't even celebrate. I just...I wish he wouldn't act so coldly towards me because of it."

For a second Mick didn't understand what Lisa was complaining about, because Len acted coldly toward _everybody_ all the time. Then Mick realized that there was one person that Len tried very hard to not treat negatively, and that was Lisa. She wasn't used to his cold attitude that he had towards everybody, including Mick. Of course she would get angry about being around Len when he acted this way, _everybody_ got angry about Len's snarky behavior.

Except, Len wasn't being snarky right now, he was being distant. He wasn't being the bitter kind of cold because he was annoyed. No, Mick recognized this type of cold behavior from Len as something that he used to protect himself from being hurt, or burned. Now, once again, Mick was wondering just what Len was trying to protect himself from. It obviously wasn't Lisa's anger, as she said that she was only upset about him being distant. This was something else.

And, once again, Mick found himself with the problem of not knowing what he was dealing with or why. He had thought that talking to Lisa would help him to understand why they were fighting, but it had just brought up more questions. See, this was why Mick didn't like involving himself in Snart family matters.

God, he needed a drink right now.

Mick grabbed a box that was actually filled with ornaments and other decorations that were made specifically for going on the tree. He muttered an excuse about taking these to Len before heading into the living room. By this time Len had finished setting up the obviously fake Christmas tree, close enough to the fire to look cozy, but far enough away to not be in danger of getting burned.

Len was staring critically at the tree, though Mick didn't get why. It looked fine. Len probably saw some imaginary fault in it. Mick set the box he was holding at Len's feet and returned to the kitchen. Mick opened the cabinet that Len had hidden the rest of the scotch in earlier and grabbed the nearly empty bottle. There wasn't a lot of alcohol left in there, but Mick was surprisingly fine with that. He didn't need a lot, he just needed something.

With the bottle in hand Mick sat down at the table and relaxed. He couldn't believe that he had forgotten to bring his own supply of booze on this trip with them, because it was hard enough to deal with the Snart siblings when they were fighting, and Mick didn't want to try to do it while sober. That just didn't sound like fun at all.

It wasn't long before Mick got really into his drink. A few minutes later he heard some discussion or argument coming from the living room, but his mind didn't process that this might be a problem. It wasn't until after he heard a crashing sound followed by sudden silence did Mick even think that something was wrong.

"Dammit." Mick swore. He quickly drank the remaining scotch (maybe a bit too quickly), set the bottle down and went into the living room, cursing the fact that he apparently couldn't leave the siblings alone for a second.

Len and Lisa were standing on opposite sides of the room. Both of them were extremely tense and for a bit Mick didn't know why, and then he noticed a shattered glass ornament right near Lisa. At least Mick now knew what the crash earlier had been. He thought for a second that Lisa had just dropped an ornament, but Mick quickly knew that that couldn't be it, because Lisa was nowhere near any ornaments, Len was.

But if Len was the one who had access to the ornaments, why would there be one that was broken near Lisa? It wasn't as if Len would have thrown one at her in a fit of anger...right?

...Oh god, that was exactly what had happened. That wasn't good.

Mick looked at Lisa and was beyond relieved to see that she didn't look scared or cautious, or even very upset, she just looked _extremely_ pissed off. Lisa was crying just a bit, which made Mick feel uncomfortable, but her tears were obviously ones of frustration, not sorrow. Now that Mick knew that Lisa was at least somewhat okay he turned his attention to Len, who was seriously less than okay.

Of the two siblings, Len was the one who actually looked the most unnerved and scared, which told Mick that Len hadn't meant to throw a glass object right at his sister, it had just happened, and that worried him. Len was somebody who always liked to be in control, and yet here he was, having just lost control of himself and coming so close to hurting the one person he had always sworn to protect.

Mick went over to Len and put a hand on his arm. Mick frowned when Len didn't even flinch or react to the touch like he normally did. He just stood there. It was like he was in shock or something.

"Do you need to get away from here, Leonard?" Mick asked quietly. For a moment Len didn't react at all, but then he gave the slightest nod. "Alright. Why don't you go wait by the car? I'll be out in a minute." Len nodded stiffly again and cautiously began to make his way out of the room. He didn't even look at Lisa as he went, he just got out of there as quickly as he could.

Mick sighed and went to go find where he had dropped his coat, because there was no way in hell he was going outside in the snow without it. As he was searching Mick found Len's coat, which he must've forgotten. Without thinking twice about it Mick grabbed his friend's coat and continued the search for finding his own.

It only took Mick another minutes for him to find his coat up in the attic. He threw it on and was just about to walk out the front door when he heard Lisa call out to him.

"Micky, are you going into town?" Lisa asked.

"Yeah." Mick grunted as an answer. He looked at her. "Did you need something?" Even though the closest town wasn't Central City the three of them still had a safe house there. Len had figured that it would be a good idea for them to have a few safe houses that weren't directly in Central City, but were near enough that it was convenient.

"Yeah, if you could just leave my brother there, that would be great." Lisa said hotly, and it seriously sounded as though she meant it. Mick frowned. He was not used to such open hostility between the siblings. It was weird, and kinda unnerving.

"See you later, Lis." Mick went outside into the cold. He felt no guilt whatsoever in leaving Lisa behind on her own right now because he knew that she was a tough girl and could take care of herself. She could handle an hour or two on her own. Mick knew that she would likely be calm and back to her normal self by the time they got back.

Mick just hoped that he would be able to say the same thing about Leonard.

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 **A/N: When I started writing this I had hoped that I would be able to finish it by Christmas, or at the very least have the Christmas Eve chapter up by Christmas Eve, and the Christmas Day chapter one up on Christmas day. I don't think that's going to happen though, because it does take a few days to write a chapter, and there's still one more chapter before those two. It will be extremely close though.**


	3. Chapter 3

Mick got into the car and quickly turned it on. He pulled out some gloves from his coat pocket and put them onto his already freezing fingers as he impatiently waited for the heater to warm up. Len slowly and silently slid into the passenger seat. Unlike Mick, Len hadn't bothered putting his coat on, he just clutched at it tightly.

Mick put the car into reverse and backed up, turning the wheel slightly as he did so until he could drive forward again. Mick drove slowly back down the sorry excuse for a driveway that was actually a five mile long dirt road. Dirt was always hard to drive on, but the snow and ice made it damn near impossible. It was definitely a challenge to drive on it, and Mick had to focus entirely on the road in front of him. As long as he was on this sorry excuse for a road, he couldn't worry about anything else.

It was an extremely slow and tense ride, but eventually he made it. The second that Mick was able to turn off the road he breathed a sigh of relief. He was on a real road now, and while he wasn't in the clear yet and couldn't quite afford to fully relax, at least things would be easier from here on out. He didn't have to focus so intently on the road. He could not turn some of his attention to other important matters.

Such as Len.

Now that he felt more secure about the road they were on Mick felt like it was safe for him to glance at Len, who hadn't said a word this whole time. It looked like Len had barely moved at all since they had started. He had his legs drawn up to his chest tightly with his coat draped loosely over them. Mick frowned when he saw that Len was clutching at his right wrist with his left hand so tightly that his fingernails were practically digging into his skin.

Mick had expected this, but he still really didn't like it. Luckily he had a method that he used to make things better, even if it was just a temporary fix. Mick took his right hand off the steering wheel, reached out and gently grabbed Len's left hand. Leonard was reluctant to let go of his own hand, but Mick was stronger than him and was easily able to force him to release his grip.

Since Len couldn't clutch at his own hand he held strongly to Mick's. Even through his glove Mick could feel the sting of Len's fingernails squeezing into his hand, but he didn't mind it. In fact, if either he or Len were going to get their hands/wrists clawed at Mick preferred it to be him. Mick's hands were calloused and rough. They were horribly scarred, so badly that his nerves were possibly damaged. He barely felt a thing.

While Len had a lot of scars on his wrists, they weren't like Mick's. They were extremely sensitive to scarring and pain, not like that had ever stopped Len before. Mick never understood why Len would scratch at and cut at his arms so much when he hated the sight of the scars. It was almost like he couldn't help himself or something. Well, that was what Mick was for, to stop Len from needlessly hurting himself. Because in Mick's opinion, Len had hurt himself at his wrists way too many times already, and they really didn't need to be hurt any more.

It was a little harder to steer with just one hand, and Mick had to be sure to drive slower than he normally would because of it. Still, he refused to let go of Len's hand. Even though he was trying very hard to hide it, Mick could feel Len's hand shaking in his own. He figured that was why Len felt the need to clutch so tightly at something, because he wanted to stop the shaking.

Len was obviously seriously bothered by what had happened back at the house. He didn't seem to be in the mood for talking about it though, at least not yet, so Mick didn't push it. Len would talk eventually when he felt like it. He always did.

They drove in near silence, with the only sound being that of Len tapping on the window with a finger of his free hand. It wasn't normal consistent tapping, Mick definitely recognized some sort of pattern there, he just didn't know exactly what it was. It seemed really familiar to him though, for some reason, and he felt like he should understand it.

Mick tried not to think about the tapping too much, at least not while they were on the icy road. He just focused on driving and not letting go of Len's hand. Mick wasn't like Len. He couldn't multitask and think while he was focusing on doing something else. It was why Mick rarely thought deeply about things, because thinking and trying to remember things just ended up distracting him from what he was doing, and more often than not that was extremely dangerous. That was why Mick usually left the thinking to Len. Mick was the brute force guy, and Len was the ideas guy. That was the way things worked.

Mick drove carefully until they finally got to the nearby town. Mick usually hated driving around towns and cities because of all of the pedestrians and stop signs, plus the reduced speed limits. He hated feeling so restricted when driving. It was so annoying. This time though he was somewhat grateful for the driving limitations because he understood what they were for.

It was the holidays, so the town was a lot more crowded with drivers and pedestrians than it usually was. So many of those idiots would be rushing carelessly from one place to another, barely putting a single thought toward their own safety of that of those around them. Mick was sure that if it weren't for the traffic restrictions and rules that a lot of people would end up getting needlessly hurt.

Even with all the rules there were still a number of idiots driving around. During their short drive in town Mick felt the strong desire to flip someone off once or twice, and he would have if it weren't for the fact that both of his hands were occupied. He just had to settle for swearing under his breath and fuming to himself. He seriously hated driving in town. Especially during the holidays.

Mick navigated around the town until they eventually got to their safehouse. The second that Mick stopped the car and turned it off Len pulled his hand out of Mick's grip and got out of the car. Mick flexed his right hand, because Len squeezing it so tightly had caused it to feel kinda funny. Mick got out of the car and followed Len into the safe house.

It was almost as cold inside the house as it was outside. Even Len, who absolutely the cold and chill of winter, had his arms wrapped around himself. Actually, not that Mick thought about it he probably wasn't doing that because he was cold. If he was then why wouldn't he just put his coat on instead of just holding it?

Mick also noticed that Len was still tapping his finger, except now he was doing it against his arm rather than the window. He was doing the same pattern as he had before and now that Mick no longer had to focus on doing something else he felt that it was safe to actually notice what he was tapping out.

It took Mick a few minutes, but he was able to make out an actual pattern. It was a lot easier to notice it after Mick realized that there was kinda a rhythm to it. And he wasn't just tapping either. There were random breaks every two or three taps, and once or twice in the pattern Len would tap his finger and then keep his finger held down for a second.

 _Tap, hold, tap, tap. Break. Tap, tap. Break. Tap, tap, tap. Break. Tap, hold._

Almost immediately after Mick realized what Len was doing he also realized that he did actually recognize this tapping. Len used to do the same exact thing back when they were in Juvie. He did it at night after lights out, occasionally when he was deep in thought, and after every single visit and letter with his little sister.

Mick vaguely remembered Len telling him once that the tapping was actually cold for something. That each sequence represented a letter, and the entire pattern spelled out a word. Len had tried to teach Mick the entire morse code alphabet, but it didn't work out very well. To this day Mick only remembered what four of the sequences meant, and they were the ones that Len had tapped out most often.

Tap, hold, tap, tap. Or, as Len called it, 'short, long, short, short'. Mick remembered that that one meant L. Tap, tap/short short was I. Tap, tap, tap/short, short, short was S. And, last of all 'tap, hold/short, long' was an A.

Basically, the thing that Len had been tapping out this entire time was L.I.S.A. Lisa…

... _Dammit._

"Don't do this, Leonard." Mick said. He saw Leonard tense at his words. Well, at least he was paying attention. "Don't blame yourself like this. You didn't even _do_ anything."

Leonard snapped around and glared harshly at Mick. "I almost hurt Lisa."

"But you didn't." Mick took a step toward him. "Yeah, you made a mistake, so learn from it and move on. Don't start hating yourself for this."

"You're one to talk." Len scoffed. Mick scowled and clenched his fists because he knew that Len was right. He was a real stinking hypocrite, giving out advice that he didn't even follow himself. But the situations were completely different. Mick's mistake had been the cause of his family's death, Len hadn't even hurt his sister, he just almost did. There really was no comparison.

And it was because of Mick's prolonged guilt that he felt for what he had done to his family that he had given that advice to Len in the first place. Mick knew how destructive guilt could be, and he didn't want that for Len. Nobody deserved to feel this level of guilt, but especially not him.

"You're taking this much harder than Lisa is, you know." Mick commented. "She wasn't even startled. She knows as much as I do that you didn't mean to do anything. You're the only one who thinks that this whole mess means more than it really does."

"She was crying." Len reminded him weakly. He always hated seeing tears in his sister's eyes, and it broke his heart every time it happened.

"Because she was pissed." Mick was feeling pretty frustrated himself right now. Why was Len so intent on blaming himself for this? "She's not even pissed off about what you did, she's just pissed off at you in general."

Len narrowed his eyes. "I _told_ you she was mad at me." Mick rolled his eyes and scowled. It seriously bugged him just how arrogant Len sounded right then. Len always seemed to get extremely smug whenever he disagreed with somebody about something and in the end it turned out that he was right all along. Mick didn't normally question Len or disagree with him, just because he hated how smug Len got when he was right...which happened more often than not.

Seriously though, somebody should not be happy to be right about something that they don't want to be true in the first place.

"If you're so smart, then you should have figured out what's bugging Lisa so much by now." Mick growled. Len eyed Mick suspiciously.

"Do _you_ know what's going on with her?" Len asked.

"She's just gettin' bitchy because you hate Christmas." Mick surmised with a shrug. Len stared at him with wide eyes.

"I don't hate Christmas." Len frowned. "I just...have bad memories with it."

Mick nodded, he had known that Len didn't truly hate Christmas, because if he did, Mick liked to think that he would have known about it. Mick then frowned. "Wait, you guys haven't ever celebrated Christmas. How can you have bad memories of it?"

Len sat down on the couch and leaned his back against the armrest. He then draped his legs over the top of the couch. It looked like an extremely awkward position, yet for some reason it was Len's favorite way to lounge on the couch. He said that it was actually really comfortable, but Mick didn't believe him.

"My _family_ never celebrated Christmas." Len said. "But when I was a kid everybody else at my school _did_."

"So what?" Mick took a seat at the other end of the couch.

Len rolled his eyes. "So because everybody else celebrated it none of the kids understood that not everybody in the world did the same thing. After winter break the only thing that anybody would talk about was what Santa gave them for Christmas. As you can imagine, I was a bit of a trouble kid at my school, so when the other kids heard that I didn't get anything for Christmas-"

"Oh, geeze." Mick groaned. Len nodded his head.

"And now you see where I'm going with this." Of course Mick saw where he was going. The whole legend of Santa had been the one thing that bothered him about Christmas. Even as a kid it always bugged him whenever people talked about how Santa Claus left gifts for the good kids, and either coal or nothing for the naughty ones. It just didn't seem right to Mick to bribe/threaten kids into behaving themselves.

"You _know_ what it feels like, Mick," Len said quietly, and Mick frowned at just the bare emotion. "You know how it feels to try your hardest, but to still have everybody say that you're not good enough."

"Yeah, I know." Mick knew that feeling all too well. As if that wasn't bad enough though, after hearing that you aren't good enough for so long you eventually start believing it. Especially if you're hearing it from a young age.

With a start Mick realized that this was probably what had probably pushed Len into his phase of believing that everything was his fault. His phase which he _still_ hadn't gotten over. It was hard enough to constantly be told by your father that you weren't good enough, but then to be told that by all of your peers as well? Even as a kid Len had been a smart person, Mick knew that much, and by a kids logic if so many people believed in one thing, then it _had_ to be true.

No wonder Len subconsciously didn't like Christmas. In his mind it was what solidified the idea that he was just a bad person who couldn't do anything right. Nobody would want a reminder of those kind of thoughts.

"And we _both_ know how annoying the holidays are in prison and Juvie." Len raised an eyebrow. Mick scowled. RIght, how could he have forgotten? Whenever Mick and Len had been in prison/juvie there had always been regular visits from priests and other self righteous, holier-than-thou Christians who were there to try to save their souls or some other bullshit. It was always really annoying, and it only got worse around Christmas and Easter.

It seemed like Len had had all kinds of experiences with people telling him he wasn't good enough. No wonder Len seemed to think that all of humanity were just a bunch of assholes.

"So while I may not exactly _hate_ Christmas time, I certainly don't like it either." Len frowned. "...I didn't know it was so obvious."

"I didn't think it was." Mick said. "But then again, I'm more familiar with your moodier side than Lis is."

"I didn't even notice there was a difference." Len scowled. He was obviously beating himself over the fact that he hadn't noticed something. He always did this. It was like Len expected himself to be some God like being who was aware of all details at all times. He expected so much from himself. He also held high expectations for everybody else, but he was harshest on himself.

"Neither did I." Mick reminded him.

"But Lisa did." Len tilted back his head and stared up at the ceiling. "Maybe I should just stay here." He said quietly.

Mick frowned. "What?"

"I'll just end up ruining things for Lisa if I stay with you guys for Christmas." Len sighed. "She doesn't deserve that."

"You think that just because you're moody means that you deserve to be by yourself?" Mick shook his head. "If you really don't want to do Christmas, you can stay here. I won't stop you. But if it's just because you don't want to bring down the mood-"

"I don't want to make Lisa angry." Len snapped.

"You don't think she'll be upset and pissed if you leave without telling her?" Mick asked. He mentioned nothing about Lisa asking him to leave her brother behind anyways, because Mick knew that if Len heard that he would most definitely stay behind. If Len saw the slightest bit of evidence that Lisa didn't want him around, he would see it as proof and make himself scarce. Just because he really didn't get that lately when Lisa said 'go away', she really didn't mean it.

"What do you expect me to do?" Len asked desperately. "She's going to be mad no matter what I do."

"Not if you explain why." Mick said, because he knew that Lisa wasn't mad that her brother was upset, she was mad that he wasn't telling her why. Lisa _wanted_ to know what was going on with her brother. The thing was, Len really didn't want to tell her. Len was against showing Lisa anything that even resembled weakness.

"She doesn't even need to know everything." Mick added before Len could argue against his suggestion. "She just wants to know _something._ " Len still didn't look convinced though, so Mick played his trump card. "If you leave Lisa in the dark so much she's gonna get sick of it one day and you'll lose her." Len crossed his arms and glared up at the ceiling, but Mick could tell by the look in his eyes that he was convinced.

"Alright, fine." Len swung his legs off the couch and sat up straight. "I'll go back with you...and talk to Lisa." Mick couldn't help but smirk, because it really did feel good whenever he managed to convince Len of something. It didn't happen very often, but man did it feel amazing when it did.

"You ready to go back now, boss?" Mick asked.

"Absolutely." Len smirked. It seemed a little forced, but Mick was glad to see that Len was at least trying to act like his normal self.

Mick pulled his coat tighter around himself and braced himself for the bitter cold of outside. Len meanwhile walked right outside without even flinching or putting his coat on. Showoff. Mick quickly got into the car while Len strolled easily, taking his time getting into the vehicle, because he was a jackass that way.

The car was already on and warming up by the time Len got in. Mick knew that he didn't really take that long, but the fact that Len had gone slowly on purpose had made it that much more annoying and made it seem that much longer.

"You did that on purpose." Mick accused with a scowl.

"I'd like to see you prove it." Len smirked in a much more genuine way than before. Mick rolled his eyes and just started driving. Already Len seemed to be more like himself than he had been all day. He wasn't curling up in his seat, scratching at his wrist, or staring outside at absolutely nothing. Len was sitting normally and facing forward. He also seemed more responsive, which was good because Mick had something else that he wanted to talk to him about.

"You sure you don't wanna know about what's goin' on, Boss?" Mick asked. Len usually liked to know everything about everything, so Mick had been very confused when he had said that he was fine with not knowing all the little details. For once, Len was letting Mick be entirely in charge.

"Yes, Mick, I'm sure." Len said without hesitation. He turned and looked Mick in the eyes. "I trust you."

"If you say so, Boss." Mick grunted as if he couldn't care either way, but on the inside he felt a warm feeling building up in his chest. It was an unfamiliar feeling, much different from the burning fire he felt in his gut whenever he was really furious. He wasn't used to people trusting him...it felt really good though. Especially since Len didn't trust people very easily. Mick recognized that Len letting him do whatever he had in mind was his way of showing Mick that he really did trust him.

It was the little moments like this that really made Mick feel like he and Len were partners, and not boss and lackey.

The rest of the drive was in complete silence, though it was a different kind of silence than the other drives that day had been. The other two had been tense and awkward. This one was just quiet in a way that almost made it pleasant. Or, at least, it would be pleasant if it weren't for the damn ice on the road.

God, did Mick hate the winter.

The drive home was a slow one, because at one point the snow falling from the sky had gotten worse. It wasn't that bad, definitely not bad enough to affect his visibility all that much, but the snow was really annoying to deal with. Mick hated it when it fell onto his windshield, and hated it even more when it fell onto the road, making it even more wet, cold, and slippery than it had been before.

By the time they pulled up to the house again the snow was really beginning to pick up, which made Mick feel glad that they had gotten back before the storm really got started. It was even colder outside than it had been before, and yet Len still wasn't wearing his coat. Mick seriously wondered sometimes if Len had powers that made him immune to the cold or something, because this just didn't seem normal to him.

Mick hurried inside while Len, once again, was just taking his time. Mick barely even noticed that the rest of the decorations that went into the front hallway had been put up. It wasn't just the little stuff that had been put up either. When Mick went into the living room the first thing he noticed was that the tree had been decorated as well. The second thing he noticed though was what really caught his attention.

Lisa was there, curled up in one of the chairs near the fire. It looked like she was asleep, which Mick found strange, because Lisa wasn't normally the type of person to take naps in the middle of the day. Just how tired was she?

Len came into the room behind Mick and took in the scene. Immediately Len took his coat which he was still holding in his hands (what was the point of him having that thing if he never even used it?) and used it to cover Lisa like a blanket or something. Lisa moaned slightly and shifted a little. She opened her eyes ever so slightly, but they snapped wide open when she saw her brother.

"Lenny!" Lisa sat up with a bolt and wrapped her arms around her older brother. Len's eyes widened a little and he staggered back the slightest bit at the contact. After a second though he relaxed. He didn't return the embrace, he rarely did, but he didn't fight against it either.

"What's goin' on with you?" Mick grunted.

"I-I thought you were going to leave." Lisa said quietly. "Don't scare me like that."

"I'm sorry." Len's expression softened. Mick smirked to himself. He had _known_ that Lisa hadn't meant it when she said she wanted Mick to leave Len behind. And that Len didn't mean it when he said he wanted to stay away from Lisa. The two of them couldn't stand being away from each other. They were just too scared to admit it.

What a couple of idiots.

Idiots or not, Mick was just glad that it looked like they would begin sorting through their problems. He wasn't stupid enough to think that this could be a permanent fix, but hey, something was better than nothing, right?

* * *

 **A/N: Oh my gosh, awkward place to end chapter is** _ **extremely**_ **awkward, but I seriously have no idea how else to end it. I really hate it when this happens.**

 **Sorry about the wait. It's kinda hard to write during the holidays, because there's always so much stuff going on. The next chapter may also be a bit, but not too long. Just keep an eye out and I'll get it up soon enough.**


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